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It's a wonderful day here at the pirate broadcast where we bring interesting people doing interesting things and today is one of those days I have a special guest.
Well, I think she's special because I've known her since the days of blab and way back when streaming video and media was really kind of challenging and so Bonnie Frank welcome to the room. Tell me what you've been doing today.

Thank you. I'm happy to be here. Oh gosh. OK so since the days of blab our IP blab we all miss it. So for those of you who are not familiar with blab, blab is a well it was it came and went quickly. But it was a wonderful live streaming platform where it had its own ecosystem. So it was kind of like walking into a movie theater and you could go into this movie or that movie or the other movie and you could watch one movie for a while and then leave and hop into another movie it was like that. So you blab had its own ecosystem and people would hop in and out of each other's broadcasts and hop in and out of the audience and hop in and out of joining the broadcast and that's where Russ and I met and I had started my business my coaching and consulting business for entrepreneurs I'd started that about a year prior and I had a couple of shows on blab and I actually built my entire business for free with live streaming.

Yeah, well I want to talk a little bit more about that and thank you so much for being here all the gratitude in the world Bonnie I know that we both love and enjoy this live streaming thing,
and there's a couple of things that I love about live streaming and I wanted to get your perspective because I think live streaming is just we're just at the tip of the iceberg because it's so,
interactive you have the opportunity to kind of you know ask for comments invite guests in and some of the things and I know you've built your business on this platform of live streaming in general. What are some other valuable aspects of live streaming that people may not know some of the benefits that people may not really truly understand unless they get into it?

Yeah, so one of the wonderful things one of the most wonderful things that I love about Livestream and that's so wonderful about it is that people can you know it really is live it's real-time.
So if you are watching a Livestream live you could watch it and replay just like you would a YouTube video or some other video that you know that you would see at any time later. But when you join a live stream live you can ask questions you can make comments and the hosts can address those comments and answer those questions right then and there and so I that's why and how I was able to build my business the way I was six days after I hopped on to it was Periscope at the time basically Twitter live. So six days after I hopped on there I started making money where I wasn't really able to make money prior to that, because I was able to answer people's business questions and answer their social media and marketing and online visibility questions right then and there. So you know it was obvious I knew what I was talking about I wasn't Wikipedia'ed it I wasn't you know rifling through all of my notes are asking my associates you know it was me they would ask me and I would give them the answers right then and there. So the back and forth and the relationships the truly deep relationships that you can form from live streaming are phenomenal.

I love the fact that you brought that up because building your authority, increasing your visibility and amplifying some of the things that your knowledge base in general and I've always been the philosophy I'll give it away and people want to work with me will show up. And that's always the way I've operated my business for better or for worse. So you have to show up you have to be present in social media isn't solving the problem however social media allows us to start the conversation and that's what I find really valuable with live streaming and the ability to just jump on, answer questions address people and talk about what is top of mind for the day and so what's your strategy been since you started and how it has it evolved over time.

So for the first two years I did no advertising I would go live and people would hire me and that was my funnel. That was my whole marketing funnels right there and then I wanted to grow faster and I wanted to grow bigger and so I would do Facebook ads and a few Instagram ads when I would launch a product and that's still really honestly the only time I advertise I do not advertise very much live streaming is still my number one lead generator after all these years it still is. I built a name with live streaming but how I have evolved is now I also have a podcast because we are live streaming is not truly mobile, has the idea of live is that you're there live to ask the questions and, and provide comments and be part of the stream but even if you if your live or if you watch it and replay it's not really mobile I mean you should be looking at your screen there should be something to look at if you're watching a video regardless. And so I have started a podcast I started it about oh eight months ago it's business fabulous. And the reason that I started a podcast was twofold. Number one was because it is mobile and you are literally in someone's head they are walking around with you in their head that was one reason and the second reason and actually that the biggest reason was that I wanted to prove that you could build a business without being in front of the camera. Now we're obviously in front of the camera right now. But if you have a podcast you don't have to stream it live. You don't have to film it and show the video on YouTube or anywhere else. You don't have to do that you could podcast in your pajamas. It doesn't matter. No one would know the difference and so that is truly why I started the podcast.

I started podcasting long before blab and for those that aren't aware this Livestream right now is being streamed to Facebook, YouTube, Periscope, LinkedIn and before the end of the day it will be converted into a transcript with show notes and also a podcast. So we're coming up on one hundred episodes and you know I've been doing this for a while and you know in and out of broadcasting and I just love the media because you are the media you have the voice you have the authority and that's the naming convention of the pirate broadcast is somebody from the FCC that if you don't have a frequency and you're licensed. You are a pirate broadcaster and the idea that you're broadcasting and you can do this live you know it's kind of out of the box and a lot of people fail to realize the value that it brings to the table. And like you mentioned you know the visibility, the ability to grow your business the ability to be the authority in the room even when you're on a camera is I mean it's monumental in in the in the world of advertising because you're building a community you're building relationships. And I suspect most of your business right now is based on the relationships you built in your online community. Is that a fair assumption.

Absolutely. I live in St. Louis Missouri in the middle of the country the middle of the states. But I had two clients in Australia before I ever had one in St. Louis. And I still after five years have only had a handful of clients in St. Louis. So it doesn't matter what continent you're on. Thank you internet. It does not matter where you are it doesn't matter what time zone you're in.
You can provide value and you can serve your audience wherever you are.

Absolutely absolutely. There is no geography left that we can't get past with live streaming and online media. So I want to give a shout out you know because there's a lot of people.
B.J. MINOR Thank you so much for being here Sherry. Thank you. I love the post you had over the weekend with the #kindnessiscool shirt. Fantastic Throppe thank you so much for being here. I love the fact that we're here and Calvin. Oh man. CALVIN Thank you so much for being here Randall and Calvin have a Livestream show here on LinkedIn. So they work in the food industry and it's amazing. They're always talking about some of the food elements that are coming out in restaurants and different activities there. Laurie Knudson Good morning. Gabriel always a pleasure to see you Fred Costa is in the room where is a good place to start live streaming. That's a great question Bonnie. I'll hand that over to you. Where's a great place to start lives streaming.

So the best place to start anything whether it's a live stream or just a social media post is wherever your audience is currently living. So if your audience is not currently living on LinkedIn
I don't know why you would start live streaming on LinkedIn. I think that you should start where your audience is already living so if you are already on that platform if you have and it doesn't matter the amount that it's the people who are engaging with you and the people who you are engaging with because it's a two way highway here. So if most of your people are on Twitter and I would live on Twitter. And that's what the periscope platform. If most of your people are on Facebook and you've got a Facebook group you could go live in your Facebook group on your page you could go live on your profile. You know there's lots of possibilities with Facebook you could do have an event you could go live and then premiere the video and be there.
You know talking about and providing more value and comments and things during the premiere so there's lots of choices there. If you're a gamer or there's actually more than gamers now on Twitch you could go live on Twitch. If you have a YouTube presence you could go live on YouTube. So there's lots of different places but the it's not that one is better than the other. Not at all.
It's where your people are. That's all that matters is for you to continue showing up where your people are.

Yeah, that's great advice. I love that concept. And also you know for someone that doesn't necessarily have a community or isn't really, you know maybe a business owner you know somebody that hasn't developed an online presence to the degree they need to you know there's a lot of options go where the audience in the community can be built easily. You know LinkedIn is a little challenging because you have to apply to be live on LinkedIn. That's a limitation of sorts, however, there are ways that you can you know continue to push and pursue that. I was fortunate I actually started the pirate broadcasts before I had linkedinlive and I would stream to YouTube and then put it on LinkedIn. I would try to treat it like it was native video the shooting live
And eventually I got on to LinkedIn and it's really kind of funny how it evolves and everything. And also one thing that would kind of pick a strategy because each one of these platforms is little different IGTV is evolving and changing. You know they're talking about monetization now where you can actually you know they're trying to look at some youtube, youtube is still viable. Everybody's saying you know how challenging YouTube is however it's you know it's still an opportunity there. So there's a lot of different things you can do.

They're all huge opportunities. It's not the platform. It's it's how you use the platform. I know I've Beta tested 15 different live platforms including this one and we're using streaming out now and I've monetized every single one. So it's not the platform in and of itself it's what you do with it. And it's how you leverage that. But I think like Russ said having a plan just like you would have a plan doing anything is really really important. So you never want to write a tweet without a plan behind it without the hashtags. You want to use without providing value to your audience and you wouldn't do that in a Livestream either. So you want to have you know an idea of what you're gonna say whether you have a script I've never scripted anything. I always would have bullet points things that I know that I want to mention. So you want to have a beginning a middle and an end. You always want to be providing value every single time you go live.
And that was one of the reasons that I was able to build an audience and to gain traction with live streaming because everyone realized that any.
And when I started live streaming I was live-streaming three to seven times a day because I was only on Periscope and it was very new. I had nothing to lose I wasn't making any money before that. And so that's why I was able to gain traction quickly but it was obvious to people that it didn't matter what day of the week what time of the day they tuned into me.
I was going to be providing value every single time and as long as you kind of get that rep, your golden because then it doesn't matter when they tune in it doesn't matter if they catch you live or if they catch you in replay they are your loyal fans they are your audience and they are there for value because you're delivering it every single time.

And that's what I love about the community that you're building it because it's really about showing up and I think that's one element that we really need to stress Bonnie is the fact that when you start live streaming or you start a presenting podcasting anything it's just, select time this comfortable for you and stay consistent you know be consistent you know like in the early days when you we're on part Periscope, made three times a day as you know you were out there you were you're pounding the platform and making sure that people were aware that you had a bit of knowledge about it and you can help them. And also I think it's really important to understand that the community will show up when you start resonating with them.
And I just want to give a shout out to some of the people that resonate with me and I love dearly is like Vickie O'Neal she's an amazing individual that has some marketing licks that she's just helping a lot of people out with and if you don't know Vicki go connect with her and she's in the room today she's talking about live streaming. Derek Monroe Jennifer, Jennifer is in the room. She's saying hi. She's awesome. She's amazing. She's out of Florida. She's always showing up. You Sheri Filsinger, all of these people I just I'm humbled by this. This community here. Bonnie and I'm sure that you have your individuals and you have people that you connect with all the time. Lonnee Rey is in the room. Podcasts are ideal for introverts as guests or hosts. That is so true. Vicki O'Neill loved blab. Gina Schreck how are you great title Bonnie podcast in your pajamas. I love that. Pants are optional right.

Yeah exactly.

So Jennifer podcasts are truly amazing. Thank you so much Russ and Bonnie Frank. Thank you so much. Jennifer loved talking to Bonnie in January. Wendy Gilhula she apparently knows you know Gabriel the best place to start anything is wherever your target audience is. Bonnie Frank That's awesome. Appreciate that. Fred Costa. Do you have a recommendation on a podcast service. Well I know what I love and I and I suspect that Bonnie has an opinion on that as well. So Bonnie do you have any thoughts. I mean it's changed considerably since I started podcasting. So tell me what your recommendations are. Bonnie you know I'll share my thoughts as well.

I have one which is Libsyn So Libsyn and hosts my podcast and I knew before I started that I was gonna use Libsyn because some of the biggest names oh like Joe Rogan use Libsyn and,
people who are in the podcasting Hall of Fame are they work for Libsyn and they travel with Libsyn and they are also answering questions like when you submit a question are you submitted for the help desk. Those are some of the people podcasting Hall of Famers or some of the people who are actually answering your questions. So that is my one suggestion and my only suggestion I wasn't going to go with anyone else although I did I went to Podfest before I started my podcast and I went around to every podcast host and I talked to all of them and I researched all of them but I still knew I was going to go with Libsyn

Libsyn's awesome. They've got some great technology and definitely they have a lot of, a lot of talent in there I went with a different solution and I'll give you the back story and it will make sense because the platform that I love in fact I got the shirt on. I don't know if you can see the shirt. I love podcasting as speaker and speaker is unique because it allowed me when I was in Houston I was live streaming all the high school varsity sports and so I would have college students go out and call the games and I would use Spreaker because I could actually put it on a tablet and Livestream it to the Web through their interface and then take that same file or that same stream and then broadcast it to AM radio, and so I had set up this entire system I had. Oh at one point in time I had about 20 people live streaming these games, and then we would go on the radio station because I was managing radio stations at the time and then we would broadcast these games on AM radio because in Texas high school varsity sports are pretty big and so I learned how to do that. So live streaming with Spreaker was another platform. Now another podcasting platform that is very simple that Spotify just purchased as Anchor, and anchor gives you an interface that allows you to get started for free and then you're broadcast on iTunes and Spotify and a few other platforms it's easy access if you're not sure you want a podcast.

Correct.

And I think to your point Bonnie if you actually graduate to Libsyn and you're really into it for the long haul you know you want a long term stable platform and you can grow with it.
But for those that I want to test it out and put some things together maybe do a a seasonal episode or something like that you might want to look at Anchor as well.

Well. Spreaker I was looking into because I knew that it was already set up for Livestream it was specifically and really totally set up and easy for live streaming so I was looking at that as well. And you know every podcast host they're all great possibilities. Whether you know it's blueberry or whether it's Podbean you know any of them. They're all there's loads and loads of great options and they all offer different things and so you need to know kind of going into it it's helpful if you know what you want if you know what you're looking for and you know they're all easy to use. They all have free and paid options. And so you just have to do a little research and decide you know what makes sense for you

Or you contact Bonnie and have the conversation with her to decide what works best for you and structure your show and put it together.

And I'll tell you to use Libsyn

So I hope that answered your question because there's a lot of opportunities. I don't know what Vicky I know you have your podcast. Maybe you could drop in the comments which platform you use as well. Kingsley Grant I agree with you Russ. It's about starting a knowing your platform. YouTube live is easy to use. Vicki says and you do YouTube like you do YouTube as well don't you.

No I do not YouTube is something I have really not built out YouTube I just never really did which maybe is surprising because I've done over 4000 livestream broadcasts just myself.
But I have never been big on YouTube. Now YouTube is wonderful and it's is a it's a home run because it's owned by Google. So that just makes sense. So it's one of the things that I'll be doing in 2020 but no I really have not leveraged YouTube and I've never used YouTube Live actually.

I've been streaming on YouTube Live. Well I was streaming to YouTube Live back in the blab days as well and it was because of the sports because I had a platform called Fan Cam TV.
And so we would go video and stream to YouTube with the live shots for promotional purposes. Kingsley Grant says he hosts on Anchor and he hosts another podcast on Libsyn. So he's doing multiples. Streamyard is the only streaming app that he's heard people using one to many.

No that's not true. First of all there are many many many more lives streaming software programs than we will ever hear about in the States for example China has about 100 of them.
So we just don't know about that many. So streamyard has one too many and it's basically no learning curve to that it's a very flat learning curve. Yes exactly it's super super easy.
You know Russ gives a link and you go to the link and now you're on the stream and that's the way you know that's the way streamyard works. It's really really easy to get guests on and off and you can have five other people on there. So it's wonderful but there are other ones the reason why I use streamyard when I'm interviewing a guest is because streamyard the developers of streamyard have absolutely paid attention from Podcasting Hall of Famers from very very established very famous podcasters who have asked for, very quality sound and streamyard has really paid attention to that so Podcasters are really hopping on streamyard and utilizing the streamyard platform. So be.live tv is another one that you can use. I happen to think that the video quality of streamyard is much better than be.live but I beta tested both of them and a whole bunch more and then so I use those sometimes and then Ecam live is another one but Ecam and ECam you can have multiple people on as well. But ECam live is only for Apple. So if you have if you have a Mac then you can use Ecam but if you have Mac or P.C b.live tv or could use streamyard or there's a whole bunch of other things as well so I'll put a link in the chat and then maybe you can put it in the show notes of if you want to see, all of the things that I use for my live streaming and for my podcasting you can go to byt.Bonnie biztools, and that is a list of everything that I use for live streaming I've got it blocked off for live streaming for podcasts for general business, and even for its selfcare just all of the products that I use because people are constantly ask me what mic do you use what this do you use what that do you use.
So like right now it's a I've got a I'm like very rude I'm not even I should they should pay me for this but like I a rode Mic I'm using a rode boom arm my mic is set up through my rode caster pro I'm like all rode,

so yeah I like that I'm using a rode Mic as well so you know the other thing that I think Vickie was mentioning also is, like I've used Ecam live in another free platform it is OBS it's open source and you can stream from there you can actually do multiple mic and cameras some amazing things and you also need to do, however you need to connect it to a service like re-stream.io or there's a couple of other platforms that allow you to stream to multiple platforms at the same time, so there's some of those elements that you need to think about and consider if you want to stream to multiple platforms simultaneously. That's why, after going through all of these and testing all of these platforms and you know I love Ecam live and sometimes on my Mac my MacBook Pro it's a little resource heavy and so you know with streamyard the processing is done on their servers and not on my mac so, however, I love the elements and I want to get into the latest release because you did a show the other day on Ecam's new opportunities and I love the rode caster pro I don't have that yet. I'm gonna to invest in that and so I love the fact that could be a possibility to generate your podcast with and also, you know don't get too hung up in all of the tools and the technology I think that's really the lesson I want to share is you know there are so many things we can do doesn't mean we need to and if you want to get started. Like I said you could you could start on your phone you know we are the media

I was just going to say that

I know we have the opportunity to get started in exactly this just get started and share your message share your voice.

And especially with live streaming. You know if you have a podcast the sound is key because that's all you've got. They're not watching you they're not reading you they are listening to you.
So stellar sound is key if you've got a podcast. So you need to you know have a good Mike. Otherwise it's not going to be great. Yeah but if your live streaming great Mic is completely optional. Really is. I did. Oh God I did thousands of live streams with my iPhone and my apple earbuds and that little tiny inch long Mic was my mic that was it. That was the only Mic I had and I was making money for a long time before I ever invested in any equipment. And then the only reason I bought this mic was because finally my Blue Yeti you know died a slow death after literally entering my second during my second podcast episode. It just died and I'm like well you were with me for almost 4000 episodes. You know I can't complain. I got I didn't buy anything until I needed it until I was really ready and I was already making money with my apple earbuds and my phone. So if the live streaming what you're doing and the message that you're delivering and the value that you're providing that's what's key. And podcasters will they constantly argue with me on this but I am absolutely dead that I am proof positive,
that the audio in live streaming is not the thing that people are tuning in for. It's just not.

Yeah well I do like audio because I am converting it into a podcast but ultimately. I think that the content is key. You know that the content we're sharing the value we're sharing. And for anyone that's listening right now if you're not connected to Bonnie get connected to Bonnie. Also I want to answer Fred's Costas question of Russ your video is so clear. Do you recommend a camera I use I use Logitech I use the 4K. I think it's in the 922C. I had the 920C which was standard for years and a lot of people use that as a microphone as well. So it's not a bad microphone at all. So you can use that.

That's looks like the 920C is this and look sits right on top of my Mac. I'm not using this right now obviously as I'm showing it to my camera right now is inside my Mac. That's my camera.
Now I do have professional lights on. So because that's when we started it wasn't very bright outside. I've a nice big window and in my studio. But it wasn't very bright outside so I turned on my professional lights. But usually I'll just have my window on the overhead light and that's it. But look what I did. I put look here because when I'm using my logitech when I'm using this and see how it can just kind of rest on top of your laptop and then it also has the screw. You can use it on a tripod. And it's not expensive at all. And look I have a sticky note because this is what I use for training and I just like look here. You look into the camera not watch yourself on the screen because when you look right now I'm watching myself on the screen probably look because I'm watching myself. So it probably looks like I'm talking to your eyebrows or the bridge of your nose but I'm not looking for any eyes right. Are you watching a livestream right now. I'm looking into the camera. So now it looks like I'm talking to you. I'm looking at you know into your eyes like you would a conversation.

Exactly. Exactly. So Bonnie how do people find you.

You can go to Bonnielfrank.com That is my Web site. And if you want to chat if you want to have a free chat for 20 minutes and pick my brain for a little bit and get based you can go to byt.lee/chat
Bonnie and I'm sure Russ will put that in the show notes as well so a byt.lee/chat if you want to hit me up and chat about live streaming podcasting build on your business whatever.

Book it. Book it. So Bonnie live streaming podcasting media getting out there. What's the information. What's the last thing that you want to share with the world today on the pirate broadcast and the wisdom that you want to leave us with.

So the biggest thing you could do. And it does not matter if you're live streaming if you're podcasting. If you're tweeting if you're doing a Facebook post if you're making a youtube video it doesn't matter what you're doing if you're making an Instagram story. It doesn't matter. Make sure that you're providing value for your target audience not for just whom ever for your target audience have a plan provide value every single time,

Thank you so much Bonnie appreciate you.

Thank you. It was so fun

And thank you so much for everyone being here. Love the fact that you're here. Wendy Jennifer Vikki O'Neal Lonnee Rey is a huge she's actually a podcasting coach to help people get past their challenges in getting out there. Sheri Lally always a pleasure, suggestions for a good Mic. I mean there's a lot of suggestions and I'll share a couple more with you in the future, there's one that just came out the rode just had NT-mini that I would love to check out and test. So I'm going to look at that one. Allof the individuals here that have joined us for the pirate broadcast all the gratitude in the world and thank you so much for being here. Bonnie as always it's a pleasure. I look forward to future conversations and even more live streaming videos coming up.
So in the future join us on the pirate broadcasts were streaming in on all the most popular social media platforms. You can always go and listen to the replays at Russjohns.com Follow me. I've updated the notifications so there's some additional value there and you'll receive some details on each one of the podcasts and broadcasts and also, you know like and share these things because you know without you I'm just sitting here talking to a microphone and a camera. So I love that you're here and thank you so much again. Bonnie
#Kindnessiscool
#Smilesarefree
and you
#enjoytheday.

I love it. Thank you so much

Take Care.